


all the stars and moons and skies

by stellerssong



Category: Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 - Malloy
Genre: Eloping, F/F, Infidelity, Multi, bad people in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-02
Updated: 2018-03-02
Packaged: 2019-03-25 11:05:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13832850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stellerssong/pseuds/stellerssong
Summary: Hélène gets the girl. The girl is, as is often the case, more than she'd bargained for.(What, you didn't think the whole abduction wasAnatole'sdoing, did you? Hilarious.)





	all the stars and moons and skies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [herowndeliverance (atheilen)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/atheilen/gifts), [the_everqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_everqueen/gifts).



She and Anatole have always been a team. Brains and—not looks, exactly, Anatole’s a pretty boy but Hélène is striking enough for the both of them, and has been since she was sixteen. No, although Anatole’s face and charm do grease the gears nicely when they’re off on one of their capers, it’s something else that he brings to their outfit.

License, perhaps, would be a better word for it.

Princess Aline would have had Hélène paddled, if it had just been her luring alley cats into her parents’ rooms through the window and trying to trap them in the closet to keep as pets; but bring Anatole into the picture and the sentence is commuted on account of “boys will be boys,” since it must have been his idea in the first place, mustn’t it? Easier to bear a grounding as well, when Anatole is there making rueful faces at her and bouncing his heels against the bed frame, as if to say, _oh well, they got us that time_ , untroubled and not the slightest bit contrite.

Dreadfully scandalous, too, for a married woman to seek lovers among the young men and—more alarming—the young women of the upper class, particularly if that married woman has already been separated from and reconciled with her wealthy but foolish husband once. Enter Anatole and his band of rakes and ne’er-do-wells, though, and the scandal recedes into the background. Of course people will whisper about _that crowd_ , but the rumors take on a veneer of untruth. _You don’t really think they tied a policeman to a bear and threw them in the river, do you? You don’t really think she has affairs with other women? People will say anything about them. You can’t believe everything you hear._

Suits Hélène just fine; while the staid boring respectable folk pat themselves on the back for their admirable skepticism, she gets her pick of the prettiest boys and girls in town, drawn to her galas and soirées by her wealth and skill as a hostess and Anatole’s bad-boy appeal. Anatole winks at her from across the salon, his arms wrapped around some morsel that wasn’t quite choice enough to tempt her, and she winks back over the shoulder of her catch of the evening. They both win.

And for all Hélène’s craft and charm, all her cleverness, all her social capital, even the queen of Moscow society couldn’t waltz into the home of Marya Dmitryevna Akhrosimova and spirit away her beloved, eligible, unmarried goddaughter without destroying herself in the process. Not a chance. The woman’s a dragon, she’d tear her to pieces, and then throw the scraps out in the snow for the ravens and the scorn of the general public.

Anatole, though…

Well, it’d still be a scandal. Marya Dmitryevna would still be out for blood. But in Hélène’s experience, people tend to be oddly sympathetic to escapades like this one when they’re carried out by a handsome young man. How romantic, they say, how dashing, it's sad for the poor fiancé, but will you _look_ at those lovebirds. Bet they’ll have a pleasant honeymoon in some foreign place while they wait for everything to blow over.

Yes, Hélène thinks. Oh, yes, she intends to.

Isn’t it lucky that she happens to have a brother with a small, isolated estate in Poland, and a set of—ahem— _relations_ he pays well to keep their mouths closed and their heads turned in the opposite direction?

Anatole had teased her for the elaborateness of her plan, moaning and lolling his head about with good-natured theatricality, griping about the _effort_ and the _blow to his good name_ that it’d inflict. As if he’s ever shied away from a sufficiently amusing plan, or had any good name to speak of. _What’s so special about this one_ , he’d said, nudging her shoulder with his own at the breakfast table, _why can’t you just have her over for tea and put a hand up under her skirt like you do for all the other girls, why’ve you got to make me stick my neck out and risk bad blood with the Bolkonskys and get the whole town talking?_

Hélène had smiled mysteriously at him, rapped his fingers with her teaspoon when he’d reached over her place setting for the sugar, made a significant face across the table at Dolokhov, and let that stand for an answer. She loves her brother, and can’t deny he’s useful, but Lord, the boy is a dolt sometimes.

If he can’t see why the little Countess in question is worth risking the ire of one eccentric, absentee fiancé, well—he’s beyond her help. Yes, she’s worth that much, and far, far more, which is why, although Hélène has entrusted the actual act of abduction to Anatole, she couldn’t bear to wait comfortably at home while he does the deed.

Icy creak-crunch of feet stamping in well-trodden snow. Hélène leans forward in the troika, pulling the fur trim of her cloak a bit closer about her face. “Stop that,” she says, in a whisper that carries in the cold still air. “Someone will hear you.”

Dolokhov makes a sour face at her, but shoves his fists deep into his pockets and stands still, pressing up against the wrought iron of the fence as though it’ll shelter him from the cold. “Nervous, Countess?” he teases, to cover the sting. “Afraid the terrible dragon’s eaten up your knight and locked the princess away in the tower? Ooh, was that a shiver? You _are_.”

“You’re drunk, Fedor Ivanovich.”

“And you’re a bitch. It’s freezing out here, we don’t all get to sit cozy in the troika, some of us have to keep the juices flowing.”

“Hmm.” Hélène makes an ostentatious show of adjusting her cloak, and Dolokhov snorts at her, spits in the snow. “What happened to standing watch? I didn’t bring you along to talk nonsense. Or to dance around in the snow like a drunk on a spree.”

“Well, as we have established, I _am_ drunk.”

“I ought to have asked that Matryona girl from the club to come with us instead. At least she can dance.”

“Yeah, you’d’ve liked that, wouldn’t you. Two pretty girls in your snuggle buggy. Lech.” And then, catching Hélène’s meaningful not-glance at the troika driver: “Oh, don’t worry about Balaga. There’s a reason we insisted on him. He hears worse than that three times a week, he knows how to keep a secret. Dontcha, pal?”

“The things I know about Fedor Ivanovich alone would blister your pretty ears, Countess,” the bearded driver—all right, _Balaga_ , whatever sort of name that is—says with a wink and a gap-toothed grin. “ _And_ I’m the best driver in all of Russia, besides.”

“Oh, of course. You hear that, Hélène? The _very_ best. Couldn’t ask for a better getaway driver than old Balaga.”

“My fine young gentlemen are too good to me, Countess, you hear how this one talks. I’d do anything for ‘em, and that’s a fact.” Balaga doffs his crumpled felt cap and then, seemingly done with the conversation, leans forward to fuss with the traces, humming under his breath. No mention of the pretty girls comment, as if he never heard it at all. Which either means that he has an incredible poker face, good enough to hide his distaste from her, or none at all, and he genuinely doesn’t care. Either way suits Hélène. She decides she likes him.

“Anyway, you know Anatole’s hooked up with Matreshka half a dozen times,” Dolokhov says with an offhanded air, trying to find a soft spot to dig at. “She’s not exactly like your little storybook princess. In case that, y’know, influences your opinion on the matter at all.”

“Mm, not really. Anatole and I have always been very good about sharing.” Her eyes flick down and up Dolokhov’s wiry frame. “As I believe you’re aware.”

And the point goes to her: Dolokhov’s face crumples like he’s just tasted something horribly bitter. Hélène almost feels sorry for him. Oh, he thinks he’s a big man, but he’s so easy, that pride of his shatters with a single flick in the right spot. You’d think he’d learn to stop trying it with her.

“Great. Sharing,” he growls. Death throes, flailing for a parting shot. Helene gazes at him, unconcerned. “Brother and sister share everything. You sharing _her_ too, then?”

“No,” says Hélène, simply. “Not her.”

And then, quiet, urgent voices—footsteps crunching in the snow—Hélène sits up straight in the troika, stares into the gloom beyond the gates. The driver and the horses and even Dolokhov cease to exist. First the pale glimmer of Anatole’s hair rises up out of the darkness, and then a brighter gleam behind him, lace and silk, a sweet, breathless laugh like silver bells.

“Go, go, hurry up, you clod,” Dolokhov hisses, hustling him forward, “the servants—we have to get out of here.”

“Don’t shove,” Anatole says petulantly, “I’m going, I’m going! _Mademoiselle_ , if you please…”

The wood of the troika creaks. Something white dazzles Hélène’s eyes for a moment, like sunlight on fresh snow, or a vision from heaven. _It’s you_ , says a voice of impossible beauty, the sense in the words rolling off her awareness like water from waxed paper, leaving only the sweetness. An angel, then. Must be. Who would think a thing like that would deign to appear for an old sinner like her? Remarkable.

“Drive, _drive_!” Dolokhov cries in a sharp, urgent voice, swinging himself up into the troika, and Balaga shouts to his horses, snaps the reins. The troika leaps into motion with a jolt and a whinny of horses, whipping freezing air into all their faces. It stings, and Hélène gasps and comes back into her own head all at once. Creak of the troika, Balaga’s shouts and the horses’ snorts, Dolokhov and Anatole crowing over the success of their caper, crammed onto the bench so tightly they’re nearly on each other’s laps.

Natalya Rostova, clad only in nightgown and light robe, pressed up against Hélène on the bench, staring at her bright-eyed and inquisitive as a little bird.

“…Um,” comes the angel’s voice again, and Hélène drops back down through the hazy spangles of starlight into her own body, observes that Natasha is looking at her, observes that her lips are moving and her brow is wrinkled in evident concern. “I—I’m here. It’s me. Just me. Are you all right?”

“I wasn’t sure you’d come,” Hélène blurts out. Realizes in that very moment that she really wasn’t. Somehow this conquest feels more improbable now than it ever did as an idea, plotted out in her boudoir over strong tea, Anatole with his feet up on the chair and Dolokhov rolling his eyes at the two of them. Quite out-of-character, for her to be so whimsical, but Hélène almost thinks Natasha will melt away like snow in the moonlight.

She persists, though, and fixes Hélène with a glare fierce enough to burn away any lingering doubt. Little bird, right—little hunting hawk is more like it, maybe. A boldness to her that didn’t show to such advantage at the ball. Arresting. She sure can pick ‘em, Hélène thinks, with a flush of victory. And Anatole, that stupid child, thought she was just a one-night stand. Let him keep poor Fedyusha, she’s got the better prize.

“I—of course I came. Of course I did. How could I not?” Natasha lets out an indignant puff of breath that clouds in the air for the briefest moment before being whisked away by the motion of the troika. “I couldn’t have stayed away. Not after—what you wrote.”

“Well. I’m glad to see my letters had an effect.”

“An _effect_?” Natasha makes an outrageous face, ignoring Hélène’s flirtatious sally entirely. “I’ve never read anything like them. Never, not in books, not anywhere.”

Good girl, oh, wonderful girl. Hélène treats Natasha to a real smile for that. Oddly difficult to keep her expression more feline-mysterious and less cat-in-the-cream smug tonight. Oh, well, she’s allowed, she thinks, and she fairly purrs as she shifts on the bench, letting Natasha bow towards her warmth.

“You must be cold, dear.” Not that she wants to separate herself from Natasha any further than the thickness of a few layers of silk and lace, but it wouldn’t exactly do to have her freeze before they even make it out of the city. “Anatole can fetch a coat from your things, if you have one—?”

Natasha’s eyes widen, and her graceful little hands work in the folds of her robe. “Oh—I—I didn’t even think. I haven’t brought anything else. No clothes or anything. It’s just me.”

“I’m not giving her mine,” Dolokhov grumbles, huddling closer to Anatole. A quaint little show of spirit, but quite unnecessary; Hélène just hums and lifts a fold of her fur cloak to wrap around Natasha’s shoulder. Not quite skin-to-skin, but close enough to suggest it, close enough for Hélène to feel the frisson run through Natasha as she spreads her fingers over a tasteful spray of black lace.

Just you _is all I wanted, that’s better than any trousseau you could have thrown together, better than a dowry and your father’s blessing_ , Hélène doesn’t say to her. Further doesn’t say _that’s practically what dressmakers are for, darling, I’ll buy you a thousand dresses and drape you in emerald and ebony and bronze and then tear it all off you, every night for as long as you’ll have me._ She’s mastering herself again, she acknowledges with a bit of relief. Better not to gush when there are witnesses around, even if Balaga is safe and Anatole is Anatole and Dolokhov is sufficiently cowed not to tell tales outside of class. She’s learned better than that. And there’ll be plenty of time for sweet nothings once they’re out of Moscow, safe at Anatole’s estate, far away from—

“I love you,” says Natasha. “I’ve wanted to tell you that, since I read your letter. Since the ball. Since the opera, maybe. I love you.”

The words smash into Hélène like a cannonball to the chest.

 _…Or we could do it like this_ , she thinks dizzily. “Oh,” is all she says out loud, a far cry from her usual eloquence.

“ _Oh_? That’s all you have to say, _oh_? I said I love you. Didn’t you hear me? I’ll say it a hundred more times if I need to. I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you—”

“You…you don’t beat about the bush, do you?” Hélène manages.

“Why should I? What’s the point? You said it already, in your letter. You said you’d die if you couldn’t have me. And I’m here now. And you’re taking me away, like you said you wanted, like I’ve been dreaming of since I saw your smile.”

“I, well, yes—”

“It wasn’t a lie, was it?” That hawk-keenness flares back up in her. “It can’t have been a lie. It _can’t_. No one can say things like that and not mean them.”

Hélène nearly laughs at her. Fancy thinking something as insubstantial as a letter need necessarily reflect anything real, that words are good for anything but nudging people to give you a fortnight’s diversion or enough cash for a night at the club. The idea that she herself might be beholden to the truth, of all things? It’s quaint as a nursery rhyme. Poor, innocent darling.

But Natasha is staring at her. And in the present context, and given everything…

“No,” Hélène says. “No, it wasn’t a lie at all.”

“Then say it. I want to hear you say it.”

Hélène swallows hard and looks Natasha full in the face, at those round dark eyes and full lips delicately parted and the curls escaping from her braid. Sweet and clean and young and oh, so ripe for the taking, a peach whose skin would bruise from the slightest touch. Hélène has never hesitated to bruise someone with those three words before, lie or not. Why is she hesitating now?

“I love you,” she says. Her voice quivers, just a little bit.

“Good.”

Natasha leans forward, quite suddenly, and then her lips are on Hélène’s, so cold they nearly burn to touch.

It’s not a young girl’s kiss, shy and quick and giggling with shock at her own daring. Natasha’s lips part against Hélène’s with a groan of pure pleasure, and she surges up against Hélène, her hands fisting in the fine soft fabric of her dress all hungry and eager. It feels like Natasha has lived years since the ball, since Hélène caught her in the hall and called her _charming_ and _enchanting_ and _bewitching_ and left that pretty moon-white gown crumpled on the floor of her bedchambers. Hélène had realized then, lying there in a tangle of bedsheets with Natasha's cries still ringing in her ears, that she needed more of the little Rostov girl than a night’s dalliance.

And, oh, God, whatever god listens to people like her, it feels like Natasha has realized the same thing about Hélène.

Hélène has been around enough to know a thing or two about desire. Natasha _wants_ , of her own accord, and Hélène can taste that, the wanting on Natasha’s tongue sharp and sweet and more like to Hélène’s desire than not. Feels like she wants to crawl inside Hélène’s skin, nest under her ribs and next to her heart. Lucky thing Hélène has already made a space for her there. She rather thinks Natasha would claw her way inside unbidden if she hadn’t prepared. Or maybe she's already done just that. There's an ache inside Hélène, after all, just left of center in her chest, and she can't think but it's the fault of the girl in her arms.

She forgives her that, though. She'd forgive her anything. How could you not?

“Yes,” sighs Natasha, and bites at Hélène’s lower lip, hard enough to make Hélène startle and gasp before pulling her closer, the sting singing through her body like the finest champagne. _Naughty, who taught you that? Surely not stick-in-the-mud Bolkonsky._ Jealousy flares for a moment, and then dies as Hélène remembers that Natasha is _hers_ now. Hers to kiss, hers to taste, hers, hers, _hers_. Who cares who she’s flirted with in the past, who else has made her heart flutter? Hélène has her now, and if she keeps making those noises Hélène is going to _have_ her now, right here, in the troika, God and the devil and all of Moscow be damned—

Something tugs on the side of Hélène’s head. “Mmf,” says Hélène, intelligently, and moves to dislodge it from her curls, but it just tugs harder, insistent enough for her to have to disentangle herself from Natasha and look. It turns out to be a hand—Anatole’s hand, to be precise. Hélène had quite forgotten Anatole was even here for a minute. But he is, indeed, still there on the bench beside them, giving her a look of great skepticism that seems most out-of-place on his face.

“Maybe you’d better wait before you celebrate too hard, eh, Lelya?” he says. “Still a long way to go before we make it to the Warsaw high road. And anyone could see you in here, carrying on like that.”

Hélène swats his hand away and fixes him with a stare that would freeze a bear in its tracks.

“Oh, we’re being cautious now? How unlike you, _Tolya_. But thank you for your—kind advice.” Unspoken warning: _you interrupt me for something as stupid as that again, and you’re losing the hand_. Natasha’s face breaks into another delighted smile, though, vivid enough to leave spots in Hélène’s vision.

“ _Lelya_? Is that what he called you?”

“It’s…a family nickname.”

“It’s wonderful! _Lelya_. It suits you. It’s so—it glitters. Dark and shining. So sleek. Like polished wood, or gold leaf. Lelya. I can’t believe anyone calls you anything different.”

She’s lucky Hélène is so mad about her. “As I said. It’s a _family_ nickname.”

“Yes—? Oh. You don’t want to be called—oh, God, I’m sorry. Ignore me.” She drops her gaze and shuffles her feet with an air of great embarrassment. “I’m a little fool, I know I am, Mamma—m-my mother always says just that when I try to tell her—words have shapes, you see, shapes and colors and feelings, only not everyone understands when I…”

“You—what?”

“The, the, you mean you don’t—of course you don’t understand. Why would you? Stupid, Natasha. Doesn’t mean anything.” She actually thumps herself on the forehead with the heel of her hand until Hélène reaches over and takes her by the wrist, places a kiss in the center of her palm. That seems to center her a little bit. At least it cuts off the nervous chatter.

“It’s a trifle, darling,” Hélène says, and Natasha glances up at her with a flicker of the girlish charm Hélène found so intoxicating from the first. “Really. We won’t speak of it anymore. Just—you know. Leave the stupid nicknames to my stupid little brother, if you please.”

Anatole squawks, and Dolokhov snickers at him, but Natasha just curls in on herself, the edge of the fur cloak slipping off her shoulder.

“Of course. I shan’t presume like that again. Um. Countess Bezukhova.”

Hélène can’t help it, this time; she throws her head back and laughs at that. _Countess Bezukhova_. Imagine. Like she’ll have any right to that name or that title after this abduction comes to light. No, even an oaf like Pierre wouldn’t be fool enough to give her a _third_ chance. Which should be a terrifying thought, the loss of her income and benefactor and position in society. But she’s not thinking straight, and Natasha is in her arms, and Natasha just kissed her, and Natasha is fleeing the country with her, and Natasha still thinks there’s any sense in paying due respect to Hélène’s rank and title, and it’s all so ridiculous that she could just die laughing.

“Please, my dear,” she chokes at last, “none of that. I didn’t mean we had to walk all the way back to _how do you do, Countess, it’s a pleasure to_ —oh, Lord.” She has to pull the cuff of her fur over her face to stifle her giggles. She’s making a scene, but Natasha takes heart from the absurdity, and knocks her shoulder against Hélène’s.

“Well, what am I to call you? No titles, no nicknames—unless,” Natasha says, with a rather wild laugh, “does this count as an elopement, if it's you doing the abducting? Should I call you _dear husband_?”

It’s Hélène’s turn to fix Natasha with a challenging stare at the not-quite-joke. Natasha’s complexion is too dark to show a blush, but her eyes glitter, starlike, and when Hélène brushes her fingers against her cheek, her skin has warmed despite the chill to a near-feverish heat.

“ _Hélène_ will do for now, I think. Just Hélène. And from there, well—we’ll see. Won’t we?”

“Yes,” says Natasha, and “Hélène,” says Natasha, and then, after a short pause, “Kiss me again.”

“Oh, Natasha,” says Hélène, and whatever else she has to say is lost to the moonlight and starlight and _swish-swish_ of runners on snow.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Soldier and Rose," which is in turn from _Ghost Quartet_. Natalya Ilynichna Rostova is a synesthete, and I will not be accepting constructive criticism on that point.


End file.
